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Subject: IYTERVIEW 7ITH JOSE GARCIA Y TRUJILLO
S-240— Folk4fays
Submitted By: Janet Smith
Original Copy, Not Rewritten
Wordage: 1,800
Date: August 26, 1936
Approved: Inc. Sizer Cassidy, State Director
smito011ommiL0
Awomow....4
S-240- Polk -Ways
Smith, Janet
8/26/36 cl-1,800
DTTEaVIEW WITH JOSE GARCIA Y TRUJILLO
Jose Garcia y Trujillo doesn't believe that Billy The Kid was
ever shot. He feels sure he ,c7ot away to South America. He wouldn't
be surprised if he is alive somewhere today, an old man with many
memories and a quick mind, like himself. When I shored him a book
by the man who killed Billy The Kid, he was unconvinced.
"No senora", and he shook his forefinger back and forth before
his face. "You think Billy The Keed let himself be shot in the dark
like that? No Senora Billy The Keed never. I see Billy The Keed
with these eyes. Many times, with these eyes. That Billy, tenia un,
agilesa en su mente en su menta aqui." He nointed to his forehead.
Mr. Garcia could sneak but little English, and I knew almost no
Spanish, bat I understood that he meant that Silly The Kid had an ex-
traordinary quickness of mind.
Again he nointed to his forehena and then with a quick motion to
the sky. "Una funcion electrica", he said. Something that worked like
lightning.
When I stopped to see Mr. Garcia he was sittinz on the ground under
the cottonwood tree that shades the cracked adobe walls of his long
narrow house. His hat was nulled down over his eyes and he seemed to
be sleeping. As I stopped the motor of my car, however, he raised his
need and. nus_ed back his net with one motion. He squinted at me, and
then pulled hi self to his feet.
"Como le va, Senora." Mr. Garcia placed the one chair in the
shade for me. He found a box behind a heap of wagon wheels and car
fenders and sat down beside me. He squinted his long blue eyes and
asked in Spanish, "What's new?"
I patted. the black kitten stretched on a bench at my elbow. Be—
side it perched a cock and two hens. Two little brown dogs nosed at
my shoes, and a. big shaggy fellow laid his heal against my arm. The
flies buzzed.
A thin dark old romFn stepped over the little goat sleepi,g just
inside the doorway of the house, its head resting on the doorstep. She
gathered up some green chili from a table in the yard, giving me an
intent look as she stood there, and went back into the house without
saying a word.
!Ir. Garcia asked me again, "What's new? YOU bring me those his—
tory books of Billy The Keed?"
I showed him the picture of Pat Garrett who shot Billy The Kid.
"I don't want to dispute against you, Senora, but in my mind which is
the picture of my soul, I know it is not true. Maybe Pat Garrett, he
give Billy The Keel money to go to South America and write that story
for the looks. Maybe he kill somebody else in Billy's place. Every—
body like Billy The Keed su vista penetraba el corazon de toda la
genter: his face went to everybody's heart."
Mrs. Garcia came out again and sat on a bench beside her husband.
Her skin looked dark nd deeply wrinkled under the white towel she had
wrapped about her head. She rolled a brown paper cigarette from some
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loose tobacco in a tin box. As her husband trlked she listened in-
tently, puffing on her cigarette. From time to time she would nod
her head at me, her eyes dark and sombre.
"What did Billy The Kid look like?" I asked.
"Chopito a. short man, but wide in shoulders an strong. His
foreheafL wrs big. His eyes were blue. He wore Indian shoes with beads
on his feet. His clothes muy desareglado 11
"Desareglado?" I asked.
"Like yours," he said, pointing to my blue denim skirt and shirt.
"Any old way.“
"Muy generoso hombre, Billy The Keed a very generous man. All
the Mexicrn people, they like him. He give money, horses, drinks
what he have. To whom was good to Billy The Keed, he was good to them.
Siempre muy caballero, muy senor always very polite, very much of a
gentleman."
"Once lots of mens, they go together after Billy The Keed to shoot
him. They pay us we go sure. But we don't rant to shoot Billy.
We always glad he too smart for us."
In broken English, mixed with Spanish phrases, Mr. Garcia told me
how he rent in a TyJsse of thirty-five or more men to capture Billy The
Kid. He didn't know the Sheriff's nale, but the description sounded
like Pat Garrett himself. "Wy, muy alto" very, very tall, and Pat
Garrett was six feet, four and a half. Jose Garcia was working at the
time as sheepherder on the ranch of Jacobo Yrissari, about ninety miles
southeast of Albuquerque. The tall sheriff came by one day with a
band of men, and offered him five dollars a day and food for himself
and his horse to join the posse in search of Billy The Kid. He said
he didn't think there was any danger of their getting Billy, and five
dollars was a lot of money. The plan was to surround the Maxwell Ranch
on the Pecos River, where Billy the Kid was known to spend much time.
This ranch belonged to Lucien Max,,,e11. "lin hombre muy grande, un
millionairion, said Jose Garcia. Lucien Maxwell was indeed one of the
most striking figures of the early mountain frontier. Every trader and
plainsman in the Rocky Mountain Region knew him. He came to New Mexico
from Illinois when the country was still a part of Old Mexico. There
he married Luz Beaubien, daughter of a French Canadian, Charles Hipolyte
Trotier, Sieur de Beaubien, and a Spanish woman. With Guadalupe Miranda,
Beaubien had received from the Mexican Government during the Adminis-
tration of Governor Manuel Armijo a huge grant of land as a reward for
pioneer services. Beaubien ogu7ht Miranda's share, and at Beaubien's
death, Lucien Maxwell, his son-in-law, purchased all the land from the
heirs and became sole owner of more than a. million acres. He made
huge sums of money selling sheep, cattle and. grin to the Government,
and built a greet house at Cimarron. There he lived in as much magni-
ficence as the tines am: the country could afford. His guests included
cattle kings, Governors, Army Officers, anki later -hen he moved to the
ranch near Fort Sumner, Billy The Kid. Nearly every day his table was
set for more than two do7en, and it is reputed that they ate on plates
of silver and drank from goblets of gold. Jose Garcia said he didn't
know anything about that for he had never been inside of the house,
but he thought it quite likely. He had been by the place at Cimarron
several times when he was working for some people by the name of
Martinez who had a ranch north of Las Vegas. The Maxwell house was
"Ulla grande mancion." But it was to the Maxwell House on the Pecos
near Port Sumner that he went in search of Billy The Kid. Maxwell
retired to his place at Fort Sumner after losing much of his wealth.
His son Pete later beceme the richest sheep man in that part of the
country. (From Leading Facts of New Mexico History, R. E. Twitchall,
Vol. 2, page 415, note 341.) It was Pete who was a friend of Billy
The Kid. Jose Garcia said he and the other men surrounded the house
for two weeks but they never got so much as a glimpse of Billy The Kid.
Mr. Garcia said he knew a. good friend of Billy The Kid, Jose
Chavez y Chavez. When he was herding sheep on the Yrissari Ranch,
which was not far from Santa Rosa on the Pecos River, Jose Chavez y
Chavez was sheep herder on a nearby rem:. One day the two of them
were sitting under a tree smoking when a pack train on the way to
Arizona came alonF, on the other side of the Pecos. Just opposite the
tree where the two sheepherders were sitting they tried to ford the
.tream. But the water was swift and the horses floundered. Jose Garcia
and Jose Chavez pulled off their clothes, jumped in and guided the
horses to the bank. After the pack train went on, Jose Chavez showed
Mr. Garcia the twenty-one bullet scars on his body. "He had an innocent
face didn't look as though he could break a dish, but he was bad with
a gun. Que hombret
"Did they try to get Jose Chavez to go with the posse after Billy?"
I asked.
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"Jose Chavez y Chavez", he corrected me. "No, senora, he had
left the country at that time.
According to ;alter Noble Burns it was this Jose Chavez y Chavez
who was responsible for the friendship between Billy The Kid and the
wealthy Maxwells. Billy The Kid had ridden over to Fort Sumner from
Lincoln with several of his men, among whom was Jose Chavez y Chavez.
The fiance of one of the Maxwell girls was drunk and met Jose Chavez y
Chavez on the street back of the Maxwell House. The two men quarreled
and Jose Chavez nulled his gun. Mrs. Maxwell ran out of the house and
tried to pull her future son-in-law away, begging Chavez not to shoot
him as he was drunk and didn't know whet he was doing. Chavez replied
that drunk or sober he was going to kill him, and he was going to dO
it immediately. Just then a. young man walked rapidly across the road,
touched his sombrero to Mrs. Maxwell, said something in Snanish to
Chavez and led him away. It was the Kid. From that time until his
death, he made Fort Sumner his headquarters, and was a frequent visitor
at the Maxwell home. It was in Pete Maxwell's room that Pat Garrett
shot him.
Mr. Garcia asked me if there were any books in Spanish about Billy
The Kid. "My rife," he said, "she tauht me to read. I didn't know
the letters when I married her. She didn't know the words but she knew
the letters and she taught re. I taught myself how the words went, but
I never could teach her to read, ni con carinoes ni alebpnzes neither
by coaxing nor praising she never could learn anythin more than the
letters."
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Mrs. Garcia shook her head. "Nblica, nunca, nunca," she said.
Never had she been able to learn more than the letters.
I promised to look for a Spanish book about Billy The Kid. I
sat for a minute longer watching some pigeons perched on a rater barrel.
They necked at the weter. The ripples reflected on their green and
lavender breasts. The little goat came out of the house and sniffed
the dirt araund my chair.
As I rose to go, Mr. Garcia stood up an1. took off his hat.
"Michas felicidades y buena salud, Senora," he said, with a little bow.
Much happiness and !-,00d health to you.
Mrs. Garcia put out her hand. Her dark eyes were always sombre.
"Adios", she said., "Que Dios vaya con usted." Goodbye, I can only say
God be with you.
"Vuelva", they called after me as I drove away. "Cone back."